Common Frustrations with eDiscovery Software

October 11th, 2016

To help understand what lawyers and their firms want from their eDiscovery software, I thought I would share some of the frustrations that many currently experience.

Since the start of this year I have collated frustrations (or problems) that some New Zealand lawyers are experiencing with their existing eDiscovery software. These frustrations are from all over New Zealand, from sole barristers, small firms right up to the some of the largest firms in the country. Some of the frustrations are –

The more documents we put in the more it struggles

We are restricted by how many people can use it

I have to be in the office to access it

We can’t run searches against the content of the documents

When our barrister makes comments we have to replicate these across other databases

We can’t give external people access

If we are loading documents, we cannot use the system

I got trained on features that I have never needed to use

The software is not intuitive at all, especially compared to other technologies

I spend much of the day on the phone to the support (which they often can’t resolve)

I want to get the documents in without having to use a 3rd party all of the time

The software was great as we started our first matter, but now I want to do more

Whenever I want to use advanced features I have to pay more to access them

We have to do discovery that way, as that is all our software can do

These frustrations were not all about the same product, but some names did crop up regularly.

Don’t shape your practices around the capabilities of your software

Many of the firms I spoke with have to shape their practices around the capabilities of their existing software.

This should never be the case !

Too often I see people stick with their existing software, when there are some great tools out there. It may be that the software suited their requirements initially, but it may no longer do. As I have mentioned previously today’s volumes of information can make some software options and practices obsolete very quickly.

At the same time as discussing these frustrations, many firms also expressed how complicated and costly they found eDiscovery to be. This is obviously a tainted perception as their frustrations are largely due to using software that may no longer meet their requirements.

Courts now require us to “ensure technology is used efficiently and effectively”, whilst approaching discovery both proportionately and cost effectively. Gone are the days that a Court will accept the argument that “we can only do discovery this way as that is all our software can do”.